


The Twelve Nights of Christmas

by misreall



Series: Loki And Nora's Infinity Stone Playlist [23]
Category: Loki: Agent of Asgard, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Arguing, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Music, Christmas Presents, Christmas Smut, Dancing, Dream Sex, Drinking, F/M, Fruit, Gardens, Gentle Kissing, Horns, Kissing, Light Bondage, Loki the Drama King, Love, Magic, Making Love, Making Out, Making Up, Marriage, Mutual Masturbation, Neck Kissing, Oral Sex, Rough Kissing, Seidr, Sex, Snakes, Too many cookies, Too many presents, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, general bad behavior, lots of birds, lots of kinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:40:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21843838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misreall/pseuds/misreall
Summary: Loki and Nora normally get along beautifully but when trauma causes him to become to over-protective she decides to return to Chicago for the holidays without him.
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Loki And Nora's Infinity Stone Playlist [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/520786
Comments: 182
Kudos: 112





	1. Santa may have brought you some stars for your shoes, but Santa only brought me the blues

Thor heard raised voices coming from Nora’s library almost as soon as he boarded his brother’s massive ship, despite the great distance between where the Bifrost had left him on the deck and the hold that had been lovingly made over for his sister-in-law’s comfort.

Needless to say Thor at first made the logical, experience-based assumption that Loki and his wife were making love. At the top of their lungs. As always.

For a moment he planned to seek out Charles, his brother’s excellent demon valet, for cookies and ale for him to while away the next few hours until they were finished, yet as he walked towards the galley he noticed there was something in the pitch and speed of their voices to give him pause. 

Despite himself, Thor started moving  _ towards _ the sounds, trying to make out their voices and what was being shouted, fully prepared to be traumatized if his new assumption was wrong and they were, in fact, making the beast with two backs.

Or, because of Loki’s ability to make clones, any number of backs.

Yet when he leaned casually toward the doors to listen, it was clearly an argument.

Then Thor stood straight up, hand covering his mouth, eyes so wide he could feel them bugging.

It was not an argument. Or a disagreement. Or a debate. 

Loki and Nora were having a fight. An ugly, screaming, profanity laden, honest to Bor fight!

There was no question that Thor envied Loki and Nora’s relationship. 

Not their love. Thor had been in love so many, many times - Sif certainly, Jane utterly, Amora reluctantly, Brunnhilde athletically, Lorelai occasionally - but he’d never had what might be called an enduring relationship. 

Even allowing as much might be an impediment to such a relationship - the most being Thor’s having to be involved in stopping the destruction of all things time and again which was very time consuming - he still found himself sometimes brooding about his solitary life.

As time went by and he grew wiser and knew himself better he came to know the irony of it, having that painful envy over the one thing that  _ Loki  _ had that _ he  _ had not. 

Once Thor was brave and for that matter drunk enough to mention it not to his brother but to Nora. 

His kind hearted sister laughed in his face. “Sorry, big guy,” she said, her head bent near to the mahogany bar top, her hand slapping it over and over, “but you know you sound like an asshole right now, right?”

“Er…” Nora was normally the one who cosseted and found ways to ease the way between himself and Loki so her response was a bit of a shock.

“No,” she lifted her head, shaking a hand towards him, “No. First off, you don’t get to EVER tell him that. I know you probably think it will make him feel better, but it won’t. It won’t. It will make him suspicious and uncomfortable and no matter how many times either of us reassure him, himself is still going to think it means you want me. 

“He’ll never sleep again.”

Thor was offended for both of them, “Surely my brother will not-”

She waved her hand close in his face, making him start back. Nora seemed to ever forget he was a god. Even a few of the Avengers treated him with more deference than she. 

Well, no they didn’t, but that was not the point.

“No! He WILL know better, and it WON’T make any difference. So shut it.” She put her fingers, smelling of hops and bacon, near his lips and pulled them away in a dramatic gesture. 

Truly, she was Loki’s wife.

“Second, second, second!” She slapped the bar again, and the bartendress brought another round unbidden, but before she could respond Loki had returned and so whilst Nora slipped off to attend to personal business Thor turned to his brother, who was also drunk, and asked in a more general way how one might go about being in love with someone for rather a long time.

Loki leaned forward, placing his elbows on the bar, “I do not know, brother, and you know how I hate to admit such a thing. Nora is … everyone likes Nora. It is astonishing the beings we have met who find all other creatures loathsome and yet still can find it them to appreciate my wife’s decency, her wit, her kindness. I  _ am _ one of those beings. She is as loveable as sleep and good food and,” he took a drink and then poured himself another, “excellent wine. 

“Yet, I alone worship her, adore her, know that she is not merely a lovely, excellent human, but a goddess. Not one of our Aesir goddesses, rather a true goddess. I am priest, acolyte, and supplicant all to her at once, and all that is beneficent in my life is at her hand. As one who lived over a thousand years without truly falling in love it still shocks me to the core that I am so fortunate as to wake with a divinity in my bed.”

“Awww…. I like you, too,” Nora’s voice came from behind them. Thor watched her coil her arms about his brother, resting her cheek on the top of his head, whilst Loki smiled into his cup, “But see, that’s it. Lots of people worship this one.” She tugged on a black strand of hair. “They don’t like him but they worship or try to placate him. Worry about what he’s going to do. And I do, too. God, do I fucking worry sometimes. But the thing is that I like him. I like you,” she said, pressing a kiss to the crown of Loki’s head. “I like you more than anyone or anything ever. I wake up every morning wondering what trouble you’ve gotten into already, and also thinking that I get to spend another day with my favorite person.”

Closing his eyes for a moment, Loki then reached around and pulled Nora onto his lap, where they settled into together with an ease and perfection of position that could only come from being together for so long. Their very bones seemed to have curved towards accommodating the other.

Thor’s heart ached, with joy and pain, their comfort, and based on the look in their eyes, their ardor. At what he lacked.

So hearing them fight so was, he surmised, like a small Midgardian child discovering there was no Santa Claus. 

At that moment, the massive doors of the storage bay that had been made over for Nora both burst open, slamming back on the walls with an ear-harming clang, so Thor knew before he saw him that Loki was exiting. His brother’s sense of drama was one of his scant predictable behaviors.

Loki stalked out, fury in every line of his body, a snarl pulling back his upper lip, his hands tensing and squeezing into fists, his hair a wild cloud of fury trailing behind him.

“Thor,” he said with a slight, haughty nod as he swept past.

Classic Loki. Thor had seen it thousands of times. 

But not lately. Not since Nora.

Who followed, practically running, “Fine, then, I’ll see you in January!” She shouted at his brother’s retreating back, then added, “Maybe!” Also noticing Thor, she too nodded, not haughty so much as distracted, “Big guy,” and then headed in the opposite direction.

Over his shoulder, Loki called out to his wife, “I hope you enjoy the shuttle trip all of the way back to Midgard, for I am locking the doorway.”

“If you aren’t with me it will be a pleasure,” she called back, her voice deceptively breezy.

Considering his two options, Thor decided it was better to find Charles.

“While I have lived among humans and creatures like humans for countless years I am afraid that some of their emotional responses are still a bit perplexing to me, sir,” Charles said as he poured Thor a tankard of glogg and offered him a plate of freshly cut gingerbread. 

It was at that moment that Thor noted that the  _ Naglikjóll  _ was bedecked with evergreen boughs and red ribbons, twinkling with magical lights of many colours and scenting the air like a pine forest on Midgard. Norns! Was it Yule already again? He had been on his latest adventure in Helheim for longer than he’d thought, but had that much time truly passed?

Knowing that they were close to Christmas helped Thor have some understanding about the rancor between Loki and Nora. “Ah, so they are fighting over where to spend the holiday? Nora wishes to go home and Loki prefers to pretend that it is not happening.”

Charles refilled his tankard. “That may be the inflexion point, Master Thor, but I fear this has been stewing for some time. Since Sakaar, or more precisely, those events that led to Master Loki’s transformation and slavery.”

“Ah, Nora’s more or less dying,” Thor said with a nod.

It had been some few years since Thor and his companions had accompanied Nora on her rescue mission to save his brother from the Grandmaster’s gladiatorial games, as well as to restore his memories, lost due to the trauma of thinking his beloved wife was rather horribly dead. 

Whilst Loki could normally devour the type of trauma that would make most beings collapse in a pile of shuddering darkness for breakfast, the idea that Nora could come to harm under his watch had proved debilitating to him. Even though he seemed to improve for a time, clearly he was more affected than he would confess to, certainly not to his brother, and apparently not even to his wife.

Over the months since those events Loki retreated more and more, spending little time anywhere but within the safety of his ship, which he kept on the farthest edges of the Nine, rarely even allowing Nora to visit her beloved home. 

In Thor’s mind he pictured Loki as the Jólakötturinn, massive, dark, and furious, crouched in a den, wrapped about Nora, lashing out with a gigantic paw with claws like scimitars whenever anyone dared approach her.

Now, Nora certainly wanted to return to Chicago for the yuletide and Loki objected, causing, predictably to even Thor, her to decide to return without him. There was some comfort in the fact that Loki was seemingly not making an effort to restrain her, as that was one area in which Nora had no tolerance for her husband’s trickster ways and regal neurosis. Should he chose not to respect her autonomy the consequences for their marriage would be dire indeed.

“Charles, when you are finished seeing to the needs of my uninvited guest, I need these items from the larder. Please bring them to my working chamber,” Loki said, his tone bored. He lounged in the doorway, a piece of parchment dangling from his fingers as he offered it to Nora’s valet. 

He was trying damned hard to look casual and was failing badly. The periodic twitch of his shoulder and the shiftiness of his eyes were telling, though Loki had always been a bit shifty. 

“Of course, sir.”

“Feel free to eat me out of ship and home and then leave, Thor. It is not a good time for a family reunion,” Loki said before adding, “Not all of the gingerbread, though,” and then slipping away.

Thor idly looked at the list whilst Charles went to the galley for more glogg.

Nine types of rope - from roughest twine to silken ribbons, all black.

A jar that has never been used.

Two cups of water than have never run through metal.

Wormwood, heather, and calamus.

A few other things, all of which tickled the part of Thor’s brain where his mother’s old attempts to teach him at least a little seidr or protective witchcraft were stored.

Normally a magic user of Loki’s power and skill would not need such simple ingredients, saving he should not want his signature to be on the spell he was -

Thor thought about nine kinds of string.

Damn. 

Loki was the most intelligent person Thor had ever known, meaning that when he chose to be stupid it was inevitably an act of monstrous idiocy, such as the one he was clearly preparing for.

Sighing, Thor drained his mug, allowing Charles to refill it, “I would recommend delaying the gathering of my brother’s items for the nonce, good servant, if your honor allows you to do so.”

Charles nodded, “Madam Nora asked me to help her fetch her bags from storage, and Master Loki always insists her needs take precedence.” 

Thor girded his loins, knowing two things. One, his conversation with Loki was going to go poorly, as was their wont. 

And after all of this was over, he really wanted to find and fight the  Jólakötturinn.

“And that is why you cannot bind your wife.” Thor finished.

Or Loki assumed he was finished. He had stopped listening to his brother about the time he had shown himself in Loki’s workroom with two mugs of glogg and a rather self-righteous air. 

Loki had accepted the first and was so used to the second he barely noticed it any longer.

A small, shouting corner of his mind recognised that this was one of those rare, gem-like moments when Thor was correct and he should listen, but the larger portion of his brain was screaming much louder that it was the worst form of irresponsible madness to let Nora go, dancing blindly on the precipice of disaster and death out in the wild universe, and that if she were to come to hate him, well, that was as would be.

Loki was very comfortable with being hated, much more so than he was Nora being dead.

Gently placing his favorite image of Nora - she was laying naked on her stomach on one of the reading couches in her library, looking at him from over the top of her book, her ankles daintily crossed and her hair a mess - in the middle of his work table he mentally sketched out the nine knots he would use with the nine pieces of cord to bind the jar in which he would place the picture, submerged in water and herbs. Should he do it perfectly she would have no idea what he had done. 

If only she were not so familiar with the tang and taste of his natural seidr it would be so much easier.

Oh, Thor was still talking. 

Loki shook his head. He could ignore his brother all day. 

There was the smallest shudder in his ship. He might not have even noticed, save that there he could see the glogg in his cup slosh just a bit.

“What was that?” he asked his  _ Naglikjóll. _

Her husky, Asgardian purr responded, “The Bifrost, my king….”

Loki frowned. Only Thor - sometimes accompanied by Sif and the Groupies Three - ever came to the ship from Asgard, which was why he had allowed the Bifrost access. “Who has arrived?”

“No one, Sire. Your wife has departed.”

Fury burned through him like acid, “THOR!”

His brother gave a sheepish shrug, “You weren’t listening, or you would have -”

“NOOOOORRRRAAAA!!!!!!!” Loki’s fury broke every bit of glass in his workroom. 

Which meant they had to flee before the miasma of odors and the rage of O-verk, the tiny, penis shrinking dragon that lived in a terrarium on a high shelf and was very glad to be free.

The first thing Nora did was use a little safety spell that Loki had given her in case something dangerous should happen to his sanity or, remembering Thanos, mental autonomy, and sealed the 999 building against him. Not just their penthouse but the whole thing.

Then she built a fire, because it was almost Christmas.

She ordered a tree and decorations, and a lot of food.

She let her friends know she was home, though it being Christmas Eve she knew she wouldn’t be seeing any of them for a few days.

Then she sat on her couch, put on a precious, rare pressing of Dean Martin’s Christmas Blues and played it twenty times, singing along louder and louder with each play as she drank most of a bottle of gluhwein.

When her voice was hoarse, and her stomach bothering her, since after hitting fifty she couldn’t drink like she used to, she plopped onto one of the wing-backed chairs near the fire and glared at the black velvet couch that was the site of many of her favorite adventures with Loki.

“Merry fucking Christmas,” she said to no one.

When Loki had finally calmed down - after wreaking a great deal of havoc on his own belongings, after several fires and the destruction of some irreplaceable garments, their gifted creators having long since died or lost their ‘edge’, after a punching match with Thor that left them both bruised and annoyed since one of the protective spells on the ship made violence over a certain level impossible and therefore disappointed their mutual desire to pound each other into unrecognizable parts, and after finally going into Nora’s library alone and bursting into enough furious tears and bellowing to leave himself worn out - he realised he was an ass.

“Fine,” he said, snapping into a  pfeffernüsse from a plate that Charles had placed on the floor and shoved into the room. “I shall simply have to be an adult about this and go and apologize.”

Which was when he found that door between his ship and Nora’s building was sealed against him.

The second round of his rage was rather shorter, but involved enough ice that even Thor had to put on a sweater.

Sulking in the library again, this time with pizelles and thumbprint cookies, he schemed. He plotted. He connived. He tapped his fingertips together and let a wide, rather sinister smile grow across his thin lips in a fashion very much like that other villainous yet misunderstood aficionado of the color green - The Grinch.

“Very well. I shall have to consult some Midgardian seasonal wisdom, for my treasure’s sake...”

On Christmas morning Nora woke up alone, except for a large fruit tree that had grown overnight in her bedroom, with a partridge teetaring at the top of its lungs.

From one limb hung an especially succulent looking pear, with a dark pink flush over its delicate flesh, she could smell it across the room.

What he  _ wanted _ her to do couldn’t be more obvious. 

She held out until bedtime, and then she took a perfect, juicy bite.

  
  
  



	2. Five Golden Rings, Four Calling Birds, A French Hen with Two Roosters, Two Turtle Doves, A Partridge in a Pear Tree, a Jotun with Horns, and a Really Big Snake.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora has a dream. Or several. It's hard to tell.

The garden was beautiful, like a grove, thick with flowering fruit and spice trees, making each warm breeze rich, nearly intoxicating with scents in addition to certain, familiar glowing blue flowers from Vanaheim and abundant, fragrant rose bushes. Here and their arbors were twined with jasmine, honeysuckle, and hops that made Nora feel gently sleepy even within the dream. Under her feet greenery was soft and thick like cushions and the sky that could be seen between boughs and leaves was in a sky that seemed locked in the softly ambient light of false dawn.

She stretched upwards and plucked a flower, tucking it behind her ear. Her body felt good. Really good for the first time in a while, because nothing hurt. Nothing was stiff. No nagging, weird thing with her back that made her hobble around some mornings, no clicking sound in her knee from that time they’d had to run from that flock of icefire-breathing chickens on Iyo and she’d stepped wrong. Even Loki’s magic hadn’t been able to help with that. Feeling no pain where pain normally was, was so damned good. Not even the nagging ache in her breastbone that she never, EVER mentioned. 

So was being outside - or inside, but an outside kind of inside - naked. Feeling fresh, soft air everywhere. Who could remember the last time they’d been off of Loki’s damned boat? She looked down at her body, which looked like it did when she first met Loki, not as it did at her current age. It looked like it always looked in her head.

After walking for a bit, enjoying the pleasure of nothing hurting, Nora noticed that she was actually on a kind of path, a subtle indent in the ground that her feet noticed but was invisible to her eye. It formed a lazy kind of spiral, slowly making its way to the center of the garden.

There, in a small clearing, a massive, ancient pear tree took pride of place, heavy with fruit, with a familiar bird gently teetering, much more pleasantly than it had in her bedroom.

Also, coiled around the truck and then hanging in loops from one of the heavier branches, was a serpent with the markings of a black and green mamba but the size of an especially large python. 

Nora snorted to herself softly. Mambas never grew much over eight feet, and certainly never close to twenty. 

She had learned rather a lot about snakes over the last twenty years.

It raised its head and blinked lazily at her, “Welcome, treasure,” it hissed out in Loki’s dark, provocative voice.

Nora stepped closer, now plucking another pear. Unlike the one in the big pot by her bed, this one was deep red, in fact nearly purple, and rather large. “You’ve never been very good at dreamwalking. Or so you’ve told me. I guess all you needed was the inspiration of getting around those wards and getting to me anyway, hmm?” she asked, raising the fruit to her nose. 

It smelled wonderful. 

Ignoring her question, Loki moved the length of his serpent's body slowly downward, “Did you know that there are scholars who contend that the forbidden fruit of Eden was a pear, not an apple?” His immense form gilded and slithered and glissaded down the rough trunk and through the undergrowth towards her, his great weight crushing it and sending up a heady scent of greenery and herbs. Before her he rose up, green slit eyes meeting hers, long fangs glittering with venom, his form undulating hypnotically.

“I thought that was figs?” she answered and took a bite, knowing what was coming and still being shocked. The arousal coiled and slithered through her blood, slow and crushing any resistance.

She was so sick of fighting with him, of fighting his fears and his need to protect her from … everything. She needed a break from it and to come home and now that he’d still found a way to get to her she was letting him have his way again.

The nectar trickled sweetly down her throat and stickily down her chin and neck and down her chest. She took another bite. It had the perfect contrast of firm, resistant skin and then the reward of soft, yielding flesh beneath.

While she ate he coiled his body around and about her. Thick scales rasped up her legs and around her torso, teasing and tickling her places where it was not normal to enjoy having a snake, even if married to a shapechanger. As it was it felt good, to be scratched and then soothed by the smooth texture of the scales in moving in either direction. 

A breathy noise and a small moan encouraged him and he tightened and slithered and just as slowly transformed and soon Nora was laying in a bower of flowers, tightly wrapped in Loki’s long arms and legs, warm, her nipples gently being lapped clean by a still forked tongue as he worked his way downwards. Barely managing to lift her head, Nora watched him settle between her legs, “This has never been the problem. Your seducing me, no matter how elaborate the setup … uhhh…” she moaned as he dragged his still snake-like fangs tenderly down her belly, “but … BUT it doesn’t change anything.”

He smiled, “Go to sleep, my love.…”

“I’m already asleep.”

“Not enough.” His fangs slowly sank into the inside of her right thigh, and because it was a dream it felt so good, the heat of his venom making her muscles go soft and her eyes close, so she drifted off.

Stretching, Nora woke up in one of the most comfortable beds she’d ever been in. Which was high praise. Rolling over, she realized two things.

She was very high up in that enormous pear tree.

In a nest.

Granted, it was a nest that was lined and pillowed with scraps of silk and velvet, woven of vines, satiny wood, and bits of downy feathers. The kind of nest that the king of birds would weave for his queen. 

Speaking of which, she felt Loki wrap an arm around her hips, pressing a kiss between her shoulder blades. “Comfortable?”

Not rolling over, Nora lifted his wrist between two fingers, pushing his arm away. He laughed and she could feel him shift onto his back. “Comfortable? You’re asking if I’m comfortable? You high-jack my dreams - yeah, I ate the stupid pear so what was I supposed to expect? But still, and after a little serpent foreplay you are going to fuck me in the treetops and think that because of that I’ll forgive you and come back to the ship.”

“Not at all. I want you to let me come home,” he said, his voice very soft. “Nor did I plan to make love to you here. I have missed laying a-bed with you, simply talking.”

Now she rolled over, leaning over him, “Whose fault is that?”

“Mine,” he said, with no embellishments.

Immediately after Sakaar Loki had been fine. The business on Asgard, then the work on his show, had been enough to keep him from thinking and thinking and then overthinking. But it had come. Once things settled in and they had returned to Chicago, for he knew Nora would want to be there for a time, he had simply not slept. His hypervigilant brain and abused nervous system had left him feeling as if even trying to sleep was worse than a night on the rack.

_ Something  _ might happen, and he could sleep through it.

Eventually, Nora and her pet enchanted chain had taken care of that and Loki had slept for days, healing his worn body but giving his mind - which was still capable of scheming and plotting even whilst unconscious - a long opportunity to work out the problem. 

The problem being in Chicago, or anywhere else on one of the Realms, they were sitting ducks for his enemies. Not that this was new information for him, of course, and not that his enemies had sought them out when Nora had been stabbed through her -

Enough!

Loki carefully flipped Nora onto her back, running a hand between her breasts, his fingertips tracing over the long, thin scar, which he then kissed reverently. “Talk to me, wife. Tell me all of those things that I have not heard for the last months.”

“Years.”

“What?”

“It’s been more than months. It’s been almost three years since Sakaar. We haven’t been home for Christmas in -”

Loki stopped hearing her. That could not be true. Three years in Nora’s meager mortal life was an endless time. He knew his own sense of how the hours passed was different from hers but still - 

She had to be mistaken, exaggerating. To have kept her on the  _ Naglikjóll  _ for so long, for her to have allowed it, would be a terrible thing.

“- and I thought that eventually, you would be well enough to get past it, which was a mistake on my part. Even you can only take so much-”

He couldn’t hear it. He bent his head to touch his lips to hers, and with true love’s kiss put his princess back to sleep.

Nora was walking through a garden in the winter. 

Stalks of flowers, bushes, and the leafless branches of trees were black against the pale violet sky of a winter twilight and were festooned with icicles, soft snow, and frost. Here and there shining green and red holly and vines of creamy white mistletoe added bits of color. Though her breath was slightly visible, she wasn’t cold, not even her bare cleavage and arms.

On her feet, delicate, embroidered shoes with tiny, curved heels moved easily over the crunching grass, and the panniers of her green velvet gown that dripped with silver lace, swayed effortlessly as if she had worn 18th-century ball gowns all of her life. Even the wig, with one dark brown curl hanging down the front into her elegant decolletage, was perfectly comfortable.

Ahead of her, golden light glowed and she could hear music and voices, punctuated by an occasional laugh.

There was a clearing beside a brook that had frozen fast in mid-burble so the water looked like glass. The ground was a thick sheet of ice, and on a dozen or more couples danced something like a minuet but also a waltz - all dressed for Versailles and gliding with effortless elegance rather than slipping and falling. 

At the far end of the clearing a quartet made up of human-sized ravens played a harpsichord, a violin, a viola, and a flute played, quite beautifully and without the benefit of hands or lips.

Even though it was far from her type of music, Nora swayed in place, smiling.

“Were you aware that colly birds was the 18th-century term for blackbirds, mon petit poule?” Loki whispered from behind her. His long fingers rested on her bare collarbone and then walked down to carefully lift the curl that rested on the small swell of her breast, which he kissed and then gently replaced.

He was speaking French and she understood it perfectly. Her husband loved the details.

His black velvet brocade coat was knee length and trimmed with silver and matching buttons, with a matching long vest, and a fall of black satin at his throat, even the wide ribbon that held his hair in a long queue was black. The heels of his shoes meant he was not merely much taller than she was, he positively loomed.

“Of course, everyone knows that,” she answered, turning towards him, raising one hand to take his so he could lead her onto the ice.

No one danced so gracefully on the ice as a Frost Giant. They turned effortlessly in neat circles that grew wider, Loki not pulling her tight against him but rather keeping some space between them so her skirts could swish and dance as well. It was like flight without fear of falling and Nora laughed. 

From time to time he would spin her, holding her hand above her head so she moved in a pirouette, but at the end of the piece of music, he pulled her close and then thrust away so she spun away from his hand, still laughing, the crowd parting for her until she found herself effortlessly caught again by cold blue hands, stopping her just before she collided with a broad chest draped in black velvet with  _ golden _ trim.

If Loki loomed, Slœgt positively towered, and that was without his great, curved horns that glinted even in the pale light. 

Dressed exactly as Loki, save for the color of his trim and his hair - a curling mane that hung like a peruke down his long back - he took her now very small looking hand in his and led her into the next dance. “Princess,” he rumbled down at her. “It’s been a while.”

It had been since Sakaar, where Loki had fully found his Jotunn side, and had run to embrace it and hide within in it so he need not face losing her.

After a few turns around the floor, where they were admired and gossiped about by the other dances, he moved so they were in the farthest corner, “Look up, girlie,” he leaned down to whisper in her ear, his breath a thrill of ice against her ear.

The tree that bowed over them - an icebound willow - was positively festooned with mistletoe.

“It’s a law,” he murmured. 

“And we know that you are all about following laws and rules and norms an-”

He cut her off with a kiss, gathering her into his arms, pulling her to his chest, his fists in the sackback of her gown, his hair brushing her skin like feathers. Nora moaned into his mouth, her heat warming him, his coldness easing the burn left in her from the venom that seemed to still be raging. 

When she reached up to tentatively stroke one of his horns he shuddered and held her tighter until her stays creaked, and she gasped for breath and fainted away in his arms, like a princess in a fairytale might.

The greenhouse within the garden was, of course, warm and beautiful and blah blah blah. 

All Nora could see was the bed in the middle of it, with iron posts on the four corners anchoring it to the ground so it wouldn’t move, and plain pine green silk sheets and cashmere blankets to show Loki’s skin to its best advantage. Every inch of it was perfectly on display was he lay there, his eyes closed but clearly awake, his hair flowing like spilled paint across the pillows, arms twined above his head so hands rested limply about the bars of the headboard.

His cock bedecked for the holiday. 

Along its length were five golden cock rings. Or rather, rings around his cock, since none of them were being used for the traditional keeping the dick hard purpose. Loki’s divine trickster junk needed no help there. Rather, as Nora approached, climbing onto the bed and crawling towards him, she saw each one was shaped differently, with patterns and textures and some provocative bulges and recesses.

Across the length of his body their eyes met. The poison green of his iris was nearly invisible, so vast and black was his pupil. He started to speak, but then gave her a snake-like smile, closed his eyes, and let her worship him for a bit. A treat she rarely was allowed, and even less rarely of late. For months and longer their love-life had felt to her like he was as much taking inventory as making love to her.

Two arms, two legs, two tits, all of the other parts, and still breathing. Assuring himself that she was there rather than being with her.

They still needed to talk, but not just then.

Placing her fingers on the inside of his ankle, Nora cupped the bone there and then ran her hand up his calf, stopping to nuzzle and kiss where she touched, her cheek stroking the silken hair, her mouth sucking on the inside of his knee.

There was a metallic groan. She grinned against his skin, her teeth skinning the flesh. Loki was squeezing those bars for dear life. Her mouth continued up his thigh, while her hand lightly scratched its twin.

By the time she was caressing his balls with her lips, her hands tight on his hips, he was shaking from the effort he was clearly exerting. Probably trying not to flip her over, to change places. “My poor prince … my poor little god…” she licked at him, just a few small laps with the very tip of her tongue, tasting the muskiness and salt of him, then teasing upwards, stroking now around the very base of his thick, painfully hard cock, where the first gold ring was cool and irregularly shaped. 

She had to carefully lift it a bit from where it rested against his torso, pausing for a moment to nose the line of hair from his navel on down. It was one of her favorite things and often they would lay in bed together talking, her head on his chest, hearing that deafening, Jotunn heartbeat and petting him there.

He lifted his head again and watched as she straddled his thighs and explored each ring, seeing where they would touch inside of her, before lifting herself and then slowly lowering herself along them.

Used to Loki’s already large, wide girth Nora felt stretched and filled and for a few moments actually uncomfortable. Putting his hands on her hips, he stroked the skin there and crooned, “Give yourself a minute, my love,” even as she felt his cock insistently throbbing within her, having other ideas that the being it was attached to.

With a determined noise, Nora began to rock back and forth.

Almost immediately the rings started to find the places within her that they were meant to tease and rub. Already wet, the extra sensation made her a positive mess, her body quivering and flushed, and she started to move with no rhythm.  _ Everything _ felt good. 

Everything.

Juddering moans fell from her lips and Loki gave her that knowing snake smile that she usually wanted to punch off of his face, but she was too distracted, “Good?” he asked.

“Don’t,” she managed to say before the first orgasm shook free.

In the midst of the wave, he rolled her over, so he leaned up one arm, one of her legs slung over his shoulder so he could kiss the marks his fangs had left before, “No mockery, my treasure, my love, my only darling beloved…” his words turned into a chant as he started mumbling nonsense to her, overwhelmed as well.

Her second orgasm was sharp and made her back arch.

Her third was almost a surprise and made her spurt and flood the bed.

Her fourth was exhausting and left her little more than a thing Loki was fucking himself with.

Her fifth had her begging for mercy that he would not give as he came himself with a shout that only did not shatter the glass of the greenhouse because it was a dream.

They fell asleep in each other’s arms.

Nora woke up alone, being squawked at by some very irritable geese.


	3. Six Cranky Geese, Seven Very Pretty Boats, Champagne, Story Time, The River of Sleep, And Some Ponies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are lots of birds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A slightly shorter chapter, apologies, but I wanted one more done before Christmas. 
> 
> Happy Holidays everyone!

Marriage to Loki had gifted Nora with vast reserves of _ sang froid. _

She had needed it

That said, there was a level of aggression and weirdness to a concentrated goose attack, and the noise they generated before she had sufficiently woken up, and the very solid and painful bite to her ankle that had been dangling from the bed that had her leaping to her feet on the bed, shrieking a little, whilst clutching a sheet to her. 

The shriek, and the little ‘ow’ noises she made as she hopped in place trying to examine the bruise the fucking bird had given her drew Loki running from wherever he has disappeared to. No doubt off doing some bit of dream magic involving swans, since that was the next part of the song. 

He burst through the closed doors, breaking glass and twisting metal in his hurry to get to her, skidded to a halt with a bemused expression at the sight of her bouncing tits and was promptly attacked by geese.

Nora was gratified and borderline hysterical to learn that even her magnificent husband could not control a broody gaggle.

Not even a dream generated broody gaggle that he had created himself. Pulling back a leg to punt a particularly aggressive Tufted Roman goose to the heavens, he only stopped when Nora called out, “Don’t you dare!” 

“They are not real,” he responded through gritted teeth, now also standing on one leg.

She just stared at him, hands firmly affixed to her hips.

“And therefore cannot be hurt?” he added.

She raised an eyebrow.

“Fine,” he bit out, putting his foot down, though still nudging the creature vigorously, earning a birdy bark of outrage from it and a scowl from Nora.

Loki waded carefully through the geese to make his way to her, causing his armor to form about him after being bitten one too many times by the irate, mothers-to-be, madly hissing snake birds. Under his golden helmet, he looked nearly as furious as they did, making his way towards her with his lip raised in a snarl and a tightness to his shoulders. 

Nora started to laugh. Not just a little laugh, or an amused giggle. Starting in her belly, each guffaw forced its way almost painfully out of her.

“Yes, quite hilarious,” Loki grumped as he lifted her in his arms, the leather and metal of his armor not cold at all because it was a dream after all. Draped in the silken sheet, which the geese were gamely trying to pull so to bring her down to their eager, snapping beaks, Nora clutched his broad, armored shoulders, buried her face against his neck, and tried to stop laughing before the inevitable snorting started.

She failed. 

Loki gave an exasperated sigh, but clutched her closer, “Perhaps it is a little funny.”

One of the birds had managed to flutter upwards, so it hovered for just a second at face level and uttered the loudest, longest, most outraged squawk in the history of avian outrage.

They looked at the huge, angry bird, then at each other, matching shock in their eyes and then burst into matching laughter, Loki laughing so hard he was practically staggering as he rescued her from the greenhouse, the victory having clearly gone to the geese.

Outside the winter garden and its ballroom and dancers were gone, replaced with a daylit forest blanketed in snow at least three feet deep, filled with trees bowing towards them under the snow’s weight. 

The snow on the ground parted before Loki’s swaggering stride, with the deferential air of an obsequious courtier hoping to attract the favor of their king. 

Nora’s thin sheet wound itself about her so it covered everywhere but her face, and then transformed into quilted silk trousers with a matching shirt, comfortable boots, cashmere mittens, and full-length velvet cloak with a fur-trimmed hood and elaborate embroidery, finishing just in time for him to set her down on the dock of what looked to be an enormous lake. 

She sighed, twitching her fingers in the mittens. She wondered how many more costume changes she was going to have before the dream was done. Loki loved nothing so much as dressing her up, never bothering to hide his despairing disdain at most of her clothing choices.

Actually, despairing disdain was probably the most positive he could manage to be about them.

As her toes touched down a drift of swan boats seven strong appeared, one of them stopping at the end of the dock, turning its elegant head towards them with a gentle creak of wood. As Nora let Loki help her in the boat winked at her once and then turned back, swimming on gracefully once they were aboard. 

While they proceeded at a stately pace Loki removed his armor, and Nora settled herself on the king-sized divan that was in the place of any proper seating. He stretched his long body and Nora knew that he was showing himself for her admiration, only dressed lightly in a tunic and suede leggings, his feet bare, oblivious to the chill he sat on the rail and dipped them in the water. “Champagne?” he asked.

Nora looked around. There was nothing but them and the couch in the swan. “Sure.”

Gathering mist from the surface of the lake, he carefully turned it into ice that turned on the tips of his fingers, carving itself into the form of a goblet that he then filled from the river, which turned itself into golden, sparkling wine. “I suppose technically I cannot call it champagne,” he said, getting himself a glass as well, and then sitting on the edge of the boat and sipping with a satisfied grin, “but I can assure the effect is the same.” 

She took a drink. He was right, and even that little sip warmed her.

For a time they just glided in silence across the still, icy water, their boat now and then trumpting to the other members of it’s drift should they be left too far behind, being lighter on the water than it was. The sound was haunting, echoing off of the water and the trees on either bank, then being answered back by the other swans. 

Finally, Nora handed Loki her goblet for a refill and broke the silence. “So now what? Do the swans turn into pretty boys and give us makeovers? There has to be something else. This is way too peaceful for you. Especially since we already did peaceful with the nest and everything.”

Loki laughed into his glass, “Alas, I had not quite finished this … verse before you were awoken by those despicable waterfowl so for now we drift and drink.”

Nora moved over, a bit clumsily because of the cloak, “Well, then, you should get comfortable.”

Loki’s eyes narrowed, “Are you certain that you wish me so near? After all, you fled across three Realms to be away from me.”

“We’ve danced, and laid around in a nest, and had some ring assisted sex, and you even fanged me in the thigh - which had better not leave a mark in real life, by the way - so come here.”

Still he did not move, “Yet all of those acts were at my instigation.”

“Stop playing the shy maiden and get over here.”

Finally, gingerly, he perched on the edge of the divan. Nora rolled her eyes to herself and then grabbed his shoulder, pulling futility at it since she couldn’t move him with a snowplow if he didn’t want it. For a moment it seemed he didn’t, but then he fell back, so his head rested on her stomach, his knees bent. He turned his head to look at her, his eyes the color of the evergreens on either side of the river, fathomless and sad. “I fear I have again put you in a position of forgiving me, assuming you sha-”

She reached down and pressed a finger to his lips, “Shhhh… Not now. Tell me a story. You haven’t told me a story in a long, long time.”

Lifting his head just enough to finish his wine, Loki nestled back against her, and closed his eyes, “Once upon a time when I was but a boy, no more than one hundred years or so, I had managed to sneak away from my parents and brother, the palace and all of my minders there, and into the Enchanted Forest, alone, for the first time, though far from the last.”

Nora did not snort, though she never didn’t find it funny that Asgard literally had a place called the Enchanted Forest and that Loki had gone there regularly. 

“Very quickly I was lost, and though I was a prince of Asgard, and had already shown some fledgling gifts of seidr, might have met my end there, had I not met a crying maiden sitting upon a fallen willow tree. A beautiful, beautiful girl who could not walk, with skin the color of smoky quartz, and thick curls even blacker than mine own, who was sick with love and wanted to marry the sky.”

As they floated along the water, Loki’s voice floated as well, dark and sonorous, telling her either the truth or a series of beautiful, elaborate lies, or some perfect and indivisible pair of the two. She no longer cared which. 

With Loki, as she alone understood, every truth was a kind of deception, and every lie contained a piece of the purest, most devastating honesty, and words were toys and baubles and more precious than pearls and silver.

After a time he grew quieter and quieter and then stopped, and for a moment Nora thought he might have fallen asleep, but rather he seemed lost in thought. 

“And then?” she prompted him.

While they had sailed and Loki spun his words, the sun had grown high and then low in the sky. Had it not been a dream Nora would have been starving, but as it was she was filled and happy on cold air and wine. It was nearly dark, and the swans seemed to be slowing, slanting across the water towards the opposite bank. 

“And then the sky said yes, and she gathered the girl into her arms and they were gone, leaving me only one perfect curl and a stick of honey candy to remember them by.”

As his story ended, the swan bumped into the dock with sound of wood striking wood and a soft, “oh-Oh” call.

Nora gave it a soft pat on the head, and it gave her a regal nod, with another creaking sound, swimming effortlessly to catch the rest of its bevy heading west.

When the setting sun reached the lake’s surface, turning everything gold, the seven swans unfurled their wooden wings and took to the sky, the thrust sending water upwards like glistening, liquid diamonds.

From the forest on this side of the lake there came a sound of … hooves, and jingling bells. 

“Ah, excellent,” Loki said, clapping his hands and then offering one to her, “Treasure, if you please.”

Nora took his hand. Warm and calloused and graceful. He lifted it carefully, kissing the back of her knuckles, giving her a very naughty look over it, and then led her to the tree line, his simple clothing now transformed into something that Baba Yaga might have picked out, with a heavy, pine green caftan with golden frogs holding it closed, heavy, curl toed boots, and a tall hat. There was even a sabre hanging from his hip.

From between the trees came a sleigh, with furs for comfort and a basket of food, pulled by eight brown ponies with green leather harnesses covered in bells.

Nora crossed her arms, “Um, I don’t know what version of the song you are going by, but day eight is maids a-milking. You know…” she started to sing, “On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me eight -”

He waved a hand, “Yes, yes, but really, do you want to know what I might come up with for that particular day?” Before she could answer that no, she really didn’t, he went on, whilst lifting her into the sleigh, “Besides which there is a very lovely variation on the song from the Faroe Islands - where I was worshipped in a more enlightened time - wherein the gift for the eighth day was eight ponies. A much more sensible gift.”

After stroking and kissing the nose of each of her new, if sadly temporary, pets Nora settled in. Normally, after laying around on a boat all day and then getting into another ride she would be stiff and sore, but in the dream world, it just seemed relaxing and right. “Well and we all know how much you like poni-”

Taking the reins in hand, he started the ponies walking and stopped her with a kiss.

Nora laid back amongst the furs and let the shhhhing noise of the snow under the runners of the sleigh and the soft sound of Loki humming to the ponies and the clops of their hooves and jingles of their harnesses lull her to sleep.

When she awoke they were in the courtyard of a grand palace, lit by torches, the moon full and silver.

Loki lifted her down, “Come along, treasure. Our guests are waiting.”


	4. Lots of People and Noise and Dancing with Dead Men, and That Other Name for the Twelfth Day of Christmas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope all of you had a wonderful, magical holiday season. The world is such a mess, but at least here we can still have our dreams.

Loki could see that Nora was neither surprised nor especially impressed with her surroundings. 

He had worked very hard on the details of the grand hall of the massive castle. Below their feet, the flagstones gleamed with colors like muted gems, while above the coved ceiling was covered in a mosaic of gold and blue tiles and hung with candle lamps made of iron and warm-toned glass to keep the vast room from seeming cold. At either end were large fireplaces roaring - admittedly they were in no way unusual save that they were festooned with evergreen and holly and lights and all of the other high-end accouterment of Midgard’s pushiest holiday. 

Even on the long, plate tracery windows, he had alternated gilt and silvered panes to gentle the glowing light that came in from the snow smothered countryside beyond.

And as a final touch, the many guests, carefully curated from their travels, capers, and scrapes, were all garbed in a more … mischievous version of Tudor court garb.

He had gone to no little effort in a very short time, and yet Nora let her fur-cape fall to the rushes on the floor, ignoring a flowing tankard offered by a passing attendant, and looked bored.

It took physical force to keep the disgruntled frown from his own face. Rather, with a smile, Loki offered her his arm. “Shall we?”

For a moment she looked at his elbow, then shrugged, “Sure.”

With just the smallest twitch, Loki lifted Nora’s limp hand and draped it over his forearm, leading her into the gathering. 

He handed her delicacies. 

She took small bites and then put them back on their trays.

He commented on the music - surprisingly mellifluous he thought, considering it was produced by only pipe and drum, each in rather large quantity.

She shrugged like a teenager being embarrassed by an overly enthusiastic parent. A gesture, he thought with a sniff, rather ludicrous coming from a woman who had recently passed Midgardian midlife.

Finally, Loki brought her to the middle of the vast room.

In the center of the guests a circle of ladies garbed in trailing velvets, gilt, and silk, and masked in the manner of mummers and thus looking sinister, melancholy, and full of mysteries one may fear to know, danced in an elaborate pattern to which each added a personal flair. 

Even though their faces were hidden, he could see Nora smile as she recognised the way Marissa’s hips swiveled, the somewhat rhythmless but highly aggressive style of Kelsey, AJ’s laugh beneath her mask as she flirted with her wife, Cici’s long-legged grace as she flirted back, Loretta’s military bearing, Sif’s rapid spins, Romanov’s balletic ease, Valkyrie’s drunken enthusiasm, and Lorelei’s tits.

Counterturning about the ladies, a line of also resplendent and masked gentlemen, jumped and spun. Dre was the best dancer, even if not the most athletic leaper. Mr. Choe looked like he wanted to be somewhere else, but what the Hel? Stark was a show-off. The Captain was not, though his wintery husband was surprisingly talented. Because Thor could actually fly - as he _never_ tired of telling everyone - he had advantages in heights reached if not skill. Volstagg was all enthusiasm. Hogan was all grace. Fandral was always a step behind as he was too busy trying to make time to keep time. Dear Charles managed to keep his dignity in this as in all things.

Clearly despite herself, Nora gave a small smile that lifted one corner of her lips.

Loki rather hated the thrill that tiny lift gave him. And how he needed the other corner to rise as well. Decades along he still wished and _craved_ Nora’s approbation and joy above all things. Nay, he desired them more as the years passed. It boded poorly for his future.

The music sped up at a stately yet relentless clip. Soon what had been an elegant series of passes was a merry set of quick turns, that then turned into a giddy, wild hurlyburly, with arms thrown here and there, legs kicked, heights reached - in the case of a few of the dancers, those heights allowed them to slap the vaulted, cerulean ceiling above.

Because it was Nora, the smile spread and her mouth opened to laugh, and her toes clicked upon the flagstone and finally she turned to him, put her hands upon his shoulders, and said, “Fine.”

Loki wrapped his fingers about her hips, grinned madly down at her, and they spun!

Oh, they spun, and coiled, turning amongst and around the two sets - now dancing with the ladies, now leaping with the lords, fleeter and more graceful than any of the rest because he was Loki and she was a dream and the music put air beneath their heels, spurring them faster and lifting them higher. 

Nora slapped the ceiling, too, feeling the slight roughness of the stone making up the vaulting, because Loki had made it, every dust mote in the air, every comfit and sweetmeat, every bit of trim on Steve Rogers’ doublet, every note played - even the slightly flat one, every bit of conversation overheard, be they flirtatious, joking, or dull, every laugh and scent and texture and taste on her tongue. 

Because his restless, wild mind could create an entire world just to amuse her and couldn’t heal itself. And again she let herself be pulled along on the journey he wanted her to take, dazzling her with his imagination and power. No matter how frustrated she might get with him, he knew how to draw her in, and she let him do it because she wanted to, she wanted him to be happy. 

He needed to win more than she did. 

Except when it was important, like now. This, this was important. They needed to wake up.

They fell softly downward, Loki landing before her so he could catch her about the waist, then let his hands slide up her sides, the callouses snagging a touch on the velvet of her gown, his thumbs inappropriately grazing over her nipples, before turning to lead her back into the fray of the dance. A thrill of lust shuddered through her body, but Nora was determined. 

Laughing and soft and wild, his hair like an angry cloud of silk about his head. Her heart clenched so hard for a second she wondered if she were having a heart attack. Then she remembered that Loki had made them both memorize the signs for myocardial infarction in a female.

Nora stopped dancing. He turned back, frowning, “Is something-”

She shook her head, “I want to dance once with Choe. I’ve missed that old lech. And then I want to go home.”

“Very well,” Loki lifted his chin, peering coldly down at her now from behind those cheekbones, his voice and neck tense, snapping his fingers. The musicians brought the manic dance to a sudden stop, causing no little amount of the dancers to stumble around and even fall from the air. 

Normally it would have amused Loki to no end to see Tony Stark fall in heap onto Thor, sending them both backward into Volstagg, but he just raised a brow, remaining nearly as frozen as he was when in his Jotunn form.

Nora stood on her toes and whispered against his lips, “I want us _both_ to go home. Together.”

One tear rolled down his face, though his expression tried to remain haughty. “Ah.”

“Yes, ‘ah’.” She called over her shoulder, “Choe, come dance with me. You look good for a dead guy.” 

“Stretch!” he called back, forcing his way between various, huge men, “Death is for the birds. Strictly Nowheresville. I can see why your better half keeps coming back. Now does the band know anything you can really dance to? This sackbutt and lute business is ok for the squares, but we need some music.” 

She looked at Loki.

He cocked his head, blinking softly at her, and snapped again.

‘You Stepped Out of a Dream’ sounded surprisingly good coming from a twenty-three piece orchestra with only two instruments, and Mr. Choe could foxtrot up a storm.

Nora woke up in her own, massive bed, all of her aches and pains returned but strangely no worse than usual, considering how long she’d been lying there. Rather, she felt rested and limber, two things that were rarer as the years passed, even with Loki’s obnoxiously doting care for her health.

Outside, the sun was rising over the lake, which was like a pool of pewter under the white winter sky. She slipped on a robe and went over to touch the glass, it was almost painful, and watching it quickly fog around her fingers, she could tell it was very cold. 

_Very_ cold, even for Chicago.

There was a soft scratching at the door. 

Charles had taken to reading historical novels in his not copious free time and had, despite how very ancient he was, lately developed a few affectations, one of them being his no longer knocking before he entered a room, but softly scratching when he wanted to enter, like a courtier at Versailles or a rather tall cat.

“Come in, er, I mean, entrez, Charles.”

Carrying a tray with coffee and scones that he set on the table near the fireplace, which he then bent to light, Charles looked rather uncomfortable. “Master Loki has been waiting outside of the building for some hours, mistress. Actually, he, um, has been sleeping outside of the building for some days. Since he hasn’t been on the public thoroughfare, but rather under the portico, and he is the co-owner of record for the building there is little the authorities could do, though they are displeased. As are the other tenants, since he has been covered in ice, making the door impossible to open.”

That explained the cold.

“Laying across my bower door like a knight of old. How dramatic.”

“Indeed madam,” Charles looked at her blandly, waiting.

“I told him he could come home,” she said, pouring herself a cup. “Go buzz him in and then start cooking bacon. He’s going to be hungry. Actually, buzz him in in a half-hour, I need a shower, and the weather isn’t going to hurt him any.”

Charles nearly smiled.

“It’s a peculiar and displeasing sensation to be escorted into one’s own living room,” Loki grumped when Charles had left the room.

Nora shrugged, drinking more coffee. “Technically while you own just under half of the building, I own this entire floor, so you are being escorted into my living room. Have some bacon,” she said, gesturing to the plate, “it’ll cheer you up.”

She had taken up the entire couch, wrapped in a knitted throw and looking rather adorable with her hair slightly damp, curling around her neck and brow. “How is it that a woman can reach five human decades without managing to learn to dry her hair all of the way?” he asked, gently touching the top of her head, letting warmth flow down and finish the job she had not done with her hairdryer.

Batting his hand away, Nora pointed at one of the chairs by the fire, “No touching, sit.”

Annoyed but still happy to have made it into the house, Loki took the entire plate of bacon with him to the chair. “It was just a-”

Nora huffed, eyes rolled upwards.

Loki frowned.

Nora _huffed_ . Nora _never_ huffed. He was the huffer of their marriage, she the huffy. Showy acts of childish temperament designed to gain an irritated response was one of his go tos, whilst his bride preferred rationality, using her gestures and words for a workmanlike result rather than to dazzle and provoke. 

“It was just you taking care of me.”

“Well, yes,” Loki replied, snapping a perfectly crisp piece of bacon.

“I don’t need you to take care of me. The room is warm, my hair being wet isn’t going to make me sick.”

“Fine, if you like your hair being a mess as it dries in a haphazard fashion then I will-”

With a roar of frustration, Nora threw off her covering and stood over him, shouting, “I’m going to die no matter what you do! It might be because of something that we do! It might be an accident! I might get sick! You have to learn to -”

Loki bolted to his feet, so they were inches apart, “Never,” he hissed down at her. “I will never learn whatever you want me to learn. I will not grow. I will not live with it, uncomplaining and understanding. From the moment I fell in love with you, your future demise has been a bleeding wound that in my side that will never heal.”

Nora dropped her head, with a groan, “Then pretend, for my sake. Don’t make me live a half-life wrapped in cotton batten and kept in a box because you’re so afraid.”

Loki stopped himself from touching her, his hands hovering in the air with no place to land. Refraining from touching her hair, her shoulder. From putting a hand on the small of her back and pulling her into his arms. Twelve days of beautiful dreaming were less glorious than stroking Nora’s cheek with the back of his fingers.

“The first time I came into your life I nearly killed you.” Now, he did touch her. One fingertip reaching to stroke the scar behind her ear. “And these decades later I nearly succeeded,” his other hand stroked the soft t-shirt she wore, gently, between her breasts. “I cannot master my fear, but I can, nay, rather I _shall_ , master my behavior.”

He tilted her head back, so he could see her bright, teary eyes, his lips quirking, “For a time, at any rate.”

“I’ll try very hard not to get killed, as well. I’m sorry I left. I know that you don’t handle being alone very well. Although I’m proud of you for using it as a creative outlet for a change instead of just smashing up your belongings and pouting.”

Loki winced inwardly. She had not seen his workroom on the _Naglikjóll_ lately….

“I just wanted to be home for Christmas. Our home, not your ship. For our holiday. You know it’s our holiday, however much you bitch about it.”

Loki looked behind her at their venerable and sturdy black velvet couch, remembering their first encounter there, Nora’s precious flesh lit only by the fireplace and the lights on the tree. “Yes, I suppose it is. How revolting ...”

Sniffling softly, whilst giving her eyes a rough wipe, Nora stepped forward to stand on his toes and push a salty kiss to his lips.

Now he gathered her to him, his eyes closing for a moment. Then whispering in her ear, “Shall we seal this new compact between us in the traditional manner? With pleasure and moaning?”

“Oh, I suppose.… But I think I might be too old for the couch these days….”

Their bed had already been remade, and when Nora bent over to pull back the blankets, Loki stepped behind her, his fingers tight on her hips, “You look so delightful just like that,” he said, his voice lower and darker than it had been even a few moments before. 

She looked over her shoulder at him. He was staring at her ass in a decidedly predatory way. Not taking inventory, but like he was going to take a big, big bite.

She wiggled it at him, knowing the consequences and looking forward to them.

For hours he undressed her, lingering heartlessly when she wanted him to move faster, fastidiously not touching her skin at all but only her garments, so by the time he had finally removed her panties she was soaking and then he started on his own.

Greedily she watched. Sometimes Loki liked to put on a show for her when taking off his clothing, but not today. He untied his oxfords, put them in the closet, loosened his tie and then pulled it out from under his collar without the snap he normally liked to give it, the same with his belt. He was simply a man taking off his clothing.

Excruciatingly slowly.

Nora’s hand drifted between her legs.

Loki stopped and wagged a finger at her, his face bland. “No. Or shall I go slower?”

Her hand moved back to her side.

At last, they were both naked, Nora sprawled face down while Loki crawled over her body like a great beast scenting his mate with his tongue and the wet from his cock trailing over her skin. He slid his hand between her and the mattress, his fingertips grazing her clit, his hard palm rubbing against her opening, “Grind on my hand, treasure. I want you to come at my touch so you will be perfectly swollen and soft when I finally fuck you.”

“I-” 

He caged her from behind, his free hand covering her mouth loosely so she could suck and bite his fingers while she worked herself on his touch, her blood molten and her whole mind dissolving like honey in hot water in her great need to come. She ached for it. 

The nuzzle of his nose in her hair, the smell of his skin, all sharper than in the dream, conversely make her more languid, and when she did climax it swept through her with a tender warmth that left her boneless.

Rolling her over, Loki smiled down at her, lifting her legs over his arms so he could thrust into her as the orgasm still throbbed, moaning at the pulse of her cunt around him. “You are my truest dream, treasure,” he whispered, moving with a steady, devastating slowness, that Nora knew was as maddening for him as it was for her.

With each easy slide through her wet, he moved a little higher, so his rough hair teased her clit, while his thick, splendid cock filled her perfectly, finding the ache in her, making it worse before making it so much better. Soon, mindless noises were coming from both of them, her heels were driving into his back as she pushed herself up to meet his strokes, his lip was snarled back, and they strove together to their mess, loud, endless finish.

After collapsing together, Nora’s back curved against Loki’s front - his ever-optimistic cock already half-hard and trying to get her attention - her stomach began to growl extravagantly. 

“I suppose I must feed you then,” he said, between kisses to her hair, her shoulder, her neck.

“You really must.”

Then his own stomach growled, loud enough to drown out hers.

It took them much less time to clean up and dress, despite the laughing.

Mostly Nora’s.

Loki had just finished pouring Nora a glass of milk punch - Charles was currently reading Dickens and so they were having a full, 19th-century feast for Epiphany, when there was a hearty pounding on their door.

“Thor,” he sighed knowingly.

Nora looked at the dinner table, “Well, I mean, this might even be too much food for us.”

Their groaning board was quite literally groaning under the weight of a standing rib roast, a pork shoulder cooked in milk, a roasted goose - which Loki planned on savaging all by himself -, a platter of lamb shanks, mushroom patties, several dozen oysters of varying types, duchess potatoes, mashed potatoes, stuffed potatoes, potato snow, potato croquettes, all three styles of clam chowder, mince pies, chestnut stuffing, corn pudding, lobster Newburg - which Nora thought was disgusting -, honied cranberries, roasted curried carrots, a few aspics - which they both tried not to look at too closely-, Brussels sprouts cooked with bacon and bourbon, poached leeks, two filled baskets of breads and rolls, stuffed onions, and then there was the dessert table.

And the little side relishes. 

And the two other punchbowls….

Loki was skeptical. “In a very real sense, neither of us has actually eaten in the last twelve days, even if the dream was powerful enough to sustain our bodies.”

“Still, it’s the-”

Charles entered without knocking, a shockingly flustered look on his face. Behind him could be heard Thor booming, “Put that down!”

“His Highness has come to join you for Twelfth Night, mistress, master, and he appears to have acquired a rather … large companion.”

There was a yowling noise, the sound of glass breaking, the thud of heavy, furry paws on parquette, and Thor shouting, “Bad kitty! Bad!”

Loki sighed, “Fill the guest bath with creamed herring, Charles, and set another place for dinner.”

"And make sure the bedroom door is shut," Nora added, "I don't want it eating my partridge. Or scratching its claws on my pear tree."


End file.
